INTRODUCTION 



By The Right Hon. LORD MOULTON, K.C.B., F.R.S. 



The professed object of the compilation of this 

 book of essays is the assertion of the importance of 

 what is usually known as " Pure Science." It admits 

 that it is motivated by a fear lest the universal 

 feeling that England has been remiss in the culti- 

 vation of large branches of Industrial Science in 

 the past and the wide-spread determination to 

 remedy this in the future may lead to a neglect 

 absolute or comparative of Pure Science after the 

 War is over and that the pursuit of Pure Science 

 may suffer by reason of the concentration of 

 national effort in the direction of the more utili- 

 tarian applications of Scientific Research. 



The immediate outcome of this apprehension 

 has been the admirable collection of Essays to 

 which I have been asked to write this Introduc- 

 tion. I feel greatly honoured by being selected for 

 the task. Each one of these Essays has been written 

 by some one who, by lifelong study and practice of 

 the Branch of Science to which it relates, has quali- 

 fied himself to give a just and authoritative de- 

 scription of the work that has already been done 



